alt Hacker NewsPalantir employees should understand that they are not regular employees at a regular company. They are U.S. defense contractors at an U.S. defense company.
Also Palantir customers should understand that by buying Palantir services/products they are doing business with U.S. defense company.
I don't say that this is positive or negative, it just clarifies the relationships and it should set the expectations.
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> Palantir employees should understand that they are not regular employees at a regular company. They are U.S. defense contractors at an U.S. defense company
I can't imagine any of them are confused about this. I'd expect most are proud to support our military.
The line that's been crossed is the military being turned against Americans. Palantir helping ICE surveil and round up folks who turned out to be, in many cases, innocent American citizens, seems to be what's prompting–correctly, in my opinion–the crisis of faith.
It's a U.S. domestic surveillance operation, disguised as a defense contractor.
Or really, it's not disguised at all. The company is named after Tolkein's palantíri, so they weren't being shy about it.
It's a company that exists solely to exploit a loophole that shouldn't have been upheld, effectively eliminating the fourth amendment.
Yeah, for sure. Defense contracting is as good or bad as the policies of the government which is going to change over time. All else being equal, if we want to live in a safe and successful society we want good/talented people working in defense. The trick is holding the government accountable for its policies and profligate defense spending.
In isolation your clarification is right, but considering that US department of War actually kills hundreds of thousands of people, there should be no question about negativity of that department
This makes it sound as though doing business with Palantir is akin to doing business with Lockheed Martin, RTX Corp (Raytheon), Northrop Grumman etc. This ignores important, qualitatively different ways that Palantir is worse: eg intentional white supremacist goals from Karp (Oswald Mosley fan) and Thiel (dismantling of multiculturalism), as well as Palantir's role in the surge of surveillance capitalism that treats US citizens as the opponent, rather than the more classic statist-aligned goals of US Govt/US Capital whose contempt for human life and human rights was pointed externally - so, while harmful, was still esstentially compatible with democratic principles.
If they can look at their leaderships statements as positive or neutral then they are part of the problem.
> they are doing business with U.S. defense company.
any time you're flying on a Boeing 737, 787, 777 etc you're doing the same. Just like every time you turn on a GE light bulb.
Boeing is a US defense contractor. Yet there are plenty of Boeing employees who can have a high expectation of ethics in their jobs.
You may think you are being even handed and neutral in some way. If you are actually, find me that part of Palantir that's doing good.
> Palantir was founded—with initial venture capital investment from the CIA
This was obvious from the start. Not sure why people "are starting to wonder", which I don't believe either.
I have had an active hand in designing weapons at a defense contractor (I was at one time an expert in external ballistics simulation) and I'd feel uncomfortable with the morality of working at Palantir.
> They are U.S. defense contractors at an U.S. defense company.
We should stop using the word "defense". They're war contractors at a war company.
The Department of Defense is the Department of War. They changed the name and then immediately started taking military action against other countries. We're in a war in Iran for reasons that nobody can quite articulate, but it certainly has nothing to do with "defending" the country.